Chapter 428
Chapter 428
Samantha gradually regained consciousness. For a moment, she wasn’t sure where she was or what had happened. Then, memories came rushing back to her. The morphus clinging to the ceiling… Tentacles sprouting from his body and shooting toward her… Two of those sinewy appendages wrapping around her throat, squeezing until her vision blurred and the world faded to black before her eyes…
As she quickly sat up, she realized she was on the floor of the security control room. To her surprise, she was still alive. Glancing upward, she saw the morphus standing in the middle of the room, directly in front of her. The mutant stood as still as a statue, his large, emotionless eyes fixed on her.
She crab-crawled backward away from the mutant, boots squealing against the floor until her shoulders collided with the cold, unyielding wall. Instinct kicking in, her right hand shot toward the familiar weight of her heavy-caliber pistol… but her fingers clutched nothing but air. Her trusty handgun was no longer in its holster.
She looked up at the mutant, who was watching her impassively.
“What do you want from me?” she asked, her voice carrying a confidence she didn’t truly feel.
The morphus, Jake, raised his right hand to his chin, drawing Samantha’s attention to the familiar device, the same one he had used in the mines to speak with her. He pressed it against the underside of his jaw, and a cold, mechanical voice resonated from the device.
“Look at that.”
With his free hand, he motioned toward the glowing bank of monitors.
She kept her gaze locked on the mutant, unwilling to look away for even a heartbeat. For all she knew, it could be a ruse: one glance elsewhere, and he might strike. The morphus remained as still as before, showing no signs of aggression whatsoever. Still, with his terrifying face and large eyes betraying no hint of emotion, it was impossible to tell what was going on in his mind.
Samantha’s gaze darted to the monitors, then back to the motionless morphus. Jake didn’t move a muscle. She frowned as some realization struck her. In that split second when she had glanced at the screens, something had felt off. Alarmingly off. Her gaze snapped back to them, this time refusing to look away. A sharp gasp escaped her lips as she fully realized what they displayed.
Most of the screens were black, indicating that they had lost connection with the surveillance cameras. Only two feeds remained active, coming from the cameras mounted on opposite walls of the HQ.
Her base was gone. Completely gone. Erased from existence as if it had never existed. All the machines installed within the perimeter walls had been reduced to unrecognizable heaps of twisted metal. Some of them looked as though they had been torn apart, while others appeared to have been melted by intense heat. The walls themselves were reduced to nothing more than piles of shattered concrete.
What the hell had happened to her base? It looked as though a powerful bomb had been dropped onto it. She was so devastated by the sight that she couldn’t immediately accept it wasn’t some kind of trick.
Then, she saw her people. Each of them was pinned down by massive winged predatory creatures. At first glance, she thought her heart would break, believing her people were dead, their bodies still and lifeless.
But then, a slight movement from one of them caught her eye, and she realized with a surge of relief that they were alive. The creatures, with their sharp talons gripping tightly, held them captive, pressing them into the cold, hard earth, not allowing them to rise or escape.
Finally, she returned her gaze to the morphus. He remained exactly where he was, motionless like a statue carved from stone, patiently waiting as she absorbed every detail displayed on the screens.
“What the fuck?” she said in a raspy voice that wasn’t her own. “What did you do? What did…”
She started to rise, but Jake lifted a hand, halting her with a sharp gesture. “Stay where you are. Don’t move. Just listen to what I have to say.”
Samantha wanted to tell him to go to hell, but the words caught in her throat. Somehow, she couldn’t find the strength to act defiantly. A wave of weakness washed over her, making her legs feel like they were made of jelly, and her head began to spin slightly. The harsh reality that this wasn’t some cruel trick, that her base had indeed been obliterated, finally sank in. Defeated, she slumped back to the cold, hard floor, her back sliding down the rough wall behind her until she was sitting, her energy sapped away by the devastating news.
Jake began speaking, “While you were out, I destroyed everything you and your people worked so hard to build. And it wasn’t even that much of an effort for me to flatten your base, mind you.”
Samantha’s face twisted in rage. Even though she already knew what had happened to her base, hearing the morphus lay it out so casually and bluntly only intensified her anger. But before she could respond, he continued speaking.
“I’ve always just been minding my own business, yet you, humans, always find a reason to come after me,” he said. “First it was Los Demonios, and now it’s you. That’s why, once I dealt with the gang, I started monitoring every human activity in this city.”
Samantha’s brows knit together as she processed his words. This was the first time she had heard about it, and the revelation caught her off guard.
“I always knew what was going on in each of your strongholds, at what rate you were developing, and even what you were up to,” Jake said, taking one step toward her. She instinctively wanted to move farther away from him, but with the wall behind her, she had nowhere to retreat. “I knew you meant to come to my lair. I saw your forces gathering, preparing for the moment you’d strike. I’ve always known you’d challenge me the instant you felt strong enough.”
Samantha just stared at him, unable to comprehend how he had learned about it. The only explanation she could think of was that he had been spying on her people, listening in on their conversations. After all, she hadn’t kept it a secret from them that she considered the morphus her enemy and intended to make a move against him in the future.
Confirming her suspicions, Jake continued, “I’m always watching you, humans. Even when you don’t see me, I’m always somewhere nearby, always watching, always listening. You can’t keep a secret from me. If you plan to make a move against me, I learn about it almost immediately. I monitor everything happening in this city. There’s nothing you can do without me finding out right away.”
He took another small step toward her. “About what happened today, consider it a warning. I obliterated your base, but I let you live. Your people received some bruises and scratches, but they’re all alive and will recover in no time. I could’ve ended all of you today, but I chose not to. I don’t see you as my enemies, so I have no reason to fight you.”
Samantha was silent, glaring up at him. There was nothing she could say to him that wouldn’t be antagonizing.
“Your base may be gone, but it’s not the end. You can rebuild it. It’ll take time, of course, but at least you can do it, since you’re all alive and well. When you’ve rebuilt, turn your attention to the Ravage Contamination instead of wasting your time and energy on someone who has no quarrel with you.”
Samantha remained silent, her lips pressed into a thin line. Her eyes were ablaze with defiance as she glared at Jake. Without any warning, numerous tendrils sprouted from his flesh before launching themselves toward Samantha. They wrapped around her body, lifting her effortlessly to her feet and pinning her back against the cold, hard wall.
As she struggled against the bindings, Jake extended a long, nasty sword from his left wrist. With a precise movement, he jabbed the point of the blade against the tender skin just beneath her chin, applying just enough pressure to break the skin. A thin trickle of blood began to snake its way down her neck, the warm liquid contrasting with the chill of the tendrils.
“Alright then, now listen to me very carefully because I’m going to say this only once,” Jake said, the mechanical voice coming from the electrolarynx devoid of emotion. “If I learn that you still plan to go against me, I’ll return. But this time, I won’t just destroy your base once again. I’ll kill every single one of your people, one by one. And then, I’ll come for you. As you already know, it won’t be hard for me to destroy your base and kill every single one of you. I repeat one more time, if I ever learn you’re still contemplating going against me, I will return and finish what I started. Do you understand me?”
Samantha’s eyes were wide, her mouth gaping as she desperately fought to draw a single breath. Two tendrils were curled tightly around her throat, rendering her unable to breathe. Her face began to turn a shade of crimson from the lack of oxygen. Just as her vision started to blur, Jake loosened the grip of the tentacles around her neck. Instantly, she gulped in a life-saving breath of air, her chest heaving with the effort.
“Tell me if you understand what I just said,” Jake said.
Samantha took a moment, drawing a few more breaths into her lungs before finally rasping, “I… understand.”
For a moment, Jake kept staring at her. She met his stare with unfiltered hatred, her eyes burning with defiance. Yet, beneath that fury, a glimmer of realization was starting to take shape. She appeared to finally understand that by planning to engage an opponent as powerful as him, she had tried to bite off more than she could chew.
Jake didn’t know if she would change her mind in the future, but for now, she seemed to accept that he was far too powerful for her to defeat. She still hated him and likely would for a long time, but Jake could live with that. All that mattered was that she kept her distance and didn’t attempt to make a move against him ever again.
Finally, he withdrew his sword and unwrapped his tentacles from her. He turned and sprang toward the door, but just before leaving the security control room, he stopped and glanced back at her over his shoulder.
“Not long ago, I warned Los Demonios to stay away from me,” he said. “As you can imagine, they ignored that warning. I’m offering you the same courtesy now: leave me be, and I’ll do the same for you. Don’t make the same mistake Los Demonios did.”